Polina Edmunds' Skating Podcasts

[macy]

has anyone else listened to these? I have listened to a few so far, and they are very interesting. she talks about her childhood and upbringing, early training, her breakthrough as a junior, and her first senior seasons including the olympics.

she speaks about judging injustices and what she learned goes on behind closed doors from personal interactions with judges, how it's all a game to hold up skaters of certain federations, not being selected for junior worlds the year she won nationals, feedback from champs camp, etc. it seems a lot of the time she was under the impression she was doing enough by skating clean programs with hard content yet kept missing podiums, or when she did end up on a podium, there was always negative feedback. she seems to have a very old school perspective on if you make mistakes, you should not be on the podium. it's really interesting to hear all of this from an elite athlete's perspective.

i highly recommend taking a listen, they are available on spotify. what are your impressions if you have listened? do you agree with her on the issues she brings up?

 

[lappo]

I listened to the first few and to me Polina came across as the embodiement of US figure skating as a whole. Unfortunately, while the whole world was trying to adapt to the new scoring system US has been stuck in the past, at least in the ladies field and until very recent years. They still prefer clean programs with low BV over unclean programs with higher BV; this preference, as signalled to the ladies at national events, has probably been the reason why the discipline has been stagnating for a while. In one of those podcasts Polina complained a lot that she won with a "clean" skate over an unclean skate with higher BV. She also compared herself a lot to Yulia, saying that she couldn't understand why Yulia was the favourite, which is quite puzzling when one remember how magnetic of a skater Yulia was at her peak.
Despite this, I agree that it is interesting to hear the perspective of the athlete even though the athlete comes off a bit self-centered at times.

 

[macy]

I listened to the first few and to me Polina came across as the embodiement of US figure skating as a whole. Unfortunately, while the whole world was trying to adapt to the new scoring system US has been stuck in the past, at least in the ladies field and until very recent years. They still prefer clean programs with low BV over unclean programs with higher BV; this preference, as signalled to the ladies at national events, has probably been the reason why the discipline has been stagnating for a while. In one of those podcasts Polina complained a lot that she won with a "clean" skate over an unclean skate with higher BV. She also compared herself a lot to Yulia, saying that she couldn't understand why Yulia was the favourite, which is quite puzzling when one remember how magnetic of a skater Yulia was at her peak.
Despite this, I agree that it is interesting to hear the perspective of the athlete even though the athlete comes off a bit self-centered at times.

this is also the impression that i got. although i know what it's like to skate clean and still not get on a podium, i almost got the impression she didn't fully understand the PCS or GOE parts of the system. you can't just skate a clean program and win when others are doing better quality elements and are better in PCS.

i too agree the part about comparing herself to someone like Julia was a bit strange. although they were the same age, they were 2 very different skaters. Julia had much more on Polina in PCS, she could draw you in and make you want to watch her. she had maturity well beyond her years.

 

[katymay]

Yes, I've listened to parts of a few while taking a walk. Some good stuff-I too had to dress in the car on the way to school (and worry about truck drivers being able to see me while I was changing. LOL) She makes some decent points- I looked up Cup of China, (referred to in her podcast-which I had forgotten-she really was at her peak then, it was a great performance. About the Junior Worlds slight-well, age eligible skaters from Seniors took the slots, and they had higher scores. USFSA sends senior skaters. Should they? I dunno. Perhaps the Junior champion ought to go, then add two of the high scoring age eligible seniors. It is hard to start getting international exposure, if you don't have the chance to have...international exposure. I think the podcast might be better if she worked from a script as it seems like she repeats things-but it is worth a listen and she makes some valid points-a very interesting story about a judge/referee which I would have liked for her to get into a bit more detail.

 

[apgold]

Polina's been on a roll lately with her podcasts - she's gotten some interesting guests in terms of up and comers like Lindsay Thorngren to Olympians like Debi Thomas. I also liked her latest with Courtney Hicks and Andrew Torgashev, who both missed Nationals due to injury.

The Debi Thomas one was particularly interesting. In addition to talking about her mom a lot and how she "bombed" at the Olympics, she also spoke a lot about her medical career. Given we know Debi has had mental health issues, she did come off a bit conspiracy theory/tinfoil hat in some regards. I thought Polina did a good job though letting her ramble but also pulling her back on topic when needed. I totally understand how Debi got disillusioned with the allopathic medical field and is now looking into alternative/energy medicine. Polina is into holistic healing so they bonded over that.

Lindsay was the opposite in terms of Debi, she did not ramble on and on and I felt like Polina had to pull some answers out of her. Sure, she is only 15 and probably not used to being interviewed.